(Science) Currently, there is anxiety that the avian H5N1 influenza virus will reassort with the highly transmissible and epidemic H1N1 subtype to trigger a virulent human pandemic. Y. Zhang et al. (p. 1459, published online 2 May) used reverse genetics to make all possible reassortants between a virulent bird H5N1 with genes from a human pandemic H1N1. Virulence was tested in mice and transmissibility was tested between guinea pigs, which have both avian- and human-like airway influenza virus receptors. To assess what is happening to the receptor-ligand interactions as a result of these mutations, W. Zhang et al. (p. 1463, published online 2 May) probed the structure of both wild-type and mutant hemagglutinin of H5 in complex with analogs of the avian and human receptor types. Certain mutations in the receptor-binding site changed binding affinity.
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